Like the disintegration of the formerly charmed stock market, the return of Carmageddon is right on schedule. I had stated early last year that one of the first cracks in our economy to become evident would be the crash of the car industry.

That crack materialized as promised, but then Hurricanes Harvey and Irma showed up to flood a million automobiles. Before any statistics materialized to show the economic impacts of those storms, I wrote the following revision for the dates of Carmageddon:

Ford Motor Co. is cleaving an additional $11.5 billion from spending plans and dropping several sedans, including the Fusion and Taurus, from its lineup to more quickly reach an elusive profit target.

The automaker is almost doubling a cost-cutting goal to $25.5 billion by 2022, Chief Financial Officer Bob Shanks told reporters Wednesday. By not investing in next generations of any car for North America except the Mustang, the company now anticipates it’ll reach an 8 percent profit margin by 2020, two years ahead of schedule.

Large-scale federal intervention into America’s energy markets began in the 1930s and continued through the 1970s. A series of major laws and executive actions sought to control energy prices, regulate electric and gas utilities, and limit imports. Competition was stifled and domestic investment was suppressed.

By the 1970s, the Middle East oil embargoes and other upheavals began making the failure of federal energy interventions clear to policymakers. They reversed course, and took major deregulatory steps in the 1970s and 1980s to free up energy markets, to the ultimate benefit of consumers and the overall economy.